sholio | I have ... a cunning plan?

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ficathon

I have ... a cunning plan?

At Writercon, we talked about various ways of getting people more involved in SGA fandom now that there's no new canon. I'd tossed around several ideas for that, but once I got back home there were a number of things that interfered, including a resurgence of my own disillusionment and feeling of alienation from the fandom, and getting very busy with the first few weeks of school.

But! I have an idea! What about kicking off 2010 with "100 Days of Episode Tags"? (Actually it would be a little less than 100 since it would probably work best to group 2-part episodes together. But whatever.) I'm thinking low-pressure/no-pressure -- people sign up to take an episode and do (at their own discretion) a fic or art or vid, wallpaper, etc for it (with super-easy minimum word count on the fic, like 500 words or something). People post their offering on their scheduled day. No penalties if you're late or can't make it. First come first served on the episodes, with the option of taking multiple eps, and also the possibility of having more than one person sign up for an ep (but only after they're all gone, or we'll have like 10 people writing for some!). Any pairing, any rating. Just take an episode(s) and do something happy for that episode on your scheduled day(s).

And yes, I am volunteering to mod. *g*

[Poll #1462215]

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My laugh is a bitter laugh. I know you've seen what happens when I try to write an episode tag**, and right now I'm drowning in fandom -- I can't even keep up with

sga_rewind, and I'm a mod!

But, you're saying "kick off 2010", which gives plenty of loin-girding time and is well past the current Big Bang season that's drowning me. So I'm in the maybe/probably camp. As long as I don't have to touch "Irresistable" or "Irresponsible". Heh.

** It is growing a sequel, or rather a pair of sequels, for which the notes just passed 27k words. Kill me now.

~~ETA: Erm, 100 episodes. At 20 episodes per season ... don't you have to handle two- and three-parters separately, even "Rising", just to hit 100?~~ That's what you meant. I'm literate, really. Nothing to see here; move along.

Edited 2009-09-25 01:19 (UTC)

LOL! I can't say I'm sad at the idea of a sequel, because I did love the first one! But, yeah, not exactly conducive to tossing off a quick episode tag. (Though -- maybe this would be good practice?)

I seem to manage either straitjacket-tight tiny wordcount limits (like traditional drabbles) or 15k+. I'm not sure I know this thing you call "moderation"! I'm terrified I'll end up with 100 new WIPs!

(My seven other existing WIPs sit sobbing in the corner as I frantically switch between beta work and nibbling at this sudden new behemoth. I'm historically terrible at titling, but I have a title for the sequel. And for its sequel. There's a naming pattern for the three. There's a plot arc across the three. The arc has a name! 28k now of notes!! Hellllllp meeeeeee ....)

It sounds like fun! I still love Atlantis so much and this fandom is just the best. It's been the most fun I've ever had and I don't want to see it end.

Yay! :)

I think that would be awesome and the no-pressure thing I think will make it successful.

I wonder if, rather than having people sign up for an episode, you make a schedule of episodes and what day they'll be celebrated, and then each day as many people as want to can post something for that particular episode. I think you'd get a wider range of participation that way.

See, my concern with that would be -- well, two things, really. One is that I've seen some of the more open-ended ficathons, which don't require signups, get really, really bad response rates when it comes time to post fic -- it seems like having public sign-ups makes writers put a little more effort into getting their fic done, even if there isn't a mod standing over them pushing them to finish. The other thing is that I suspect if it was completely open-ended, we'd get several tags each for a handful of popular episodes (Trinity, Shrine) and nothing at all for a good half to 2/3 of the episodes in the series, especially those focused on less popular characters, whereas I'd prefer to see it spread out a bit more.

However, maybe a combination approach -- having people sign up for an episode or episodes, but as each day's episode comes up, anyone can post something for it if they want to.

*nods*

I've modded a no pressure ficathon based on prompts before and the turn out was less than I had expected, probably because I *didn't* ask people to officially sign up. They could just choose a prompt from the list and then whoever had written something could post it on the day.

I think a combination of the two, as you suggest, might be the best way to go then, because you'd have at least one person dedicated to posting something for each ep, but fandom at large free to play willy nilly as it chooses.

I do like this idea, having a combination of the two. I know my own muse likes having something specific to work on. If I sign up for a particular episode, it gives an impetus to work on that. But then sometimes you get caught by an idea. It would be cool to have the option to post something additional if the muse does strike.

*raises hand* I'm definitely interested and like the combination approach, and just wanted to add that I think publishing the schedule before sign-ups is definitely a good plan, so that people don't accidentally sign up for when they're on holiday/getting married/having root canal work or similar ;)

But yes, definitely up for it :D

Oh yes, definitely gonna have a very clear schedule; I don't want anyone to run into scheduling conflicts if I can help it! (And yay!) :)

I'm not sure I could play (I've had an odd renewed interest in SGA recently) since I've been avoiding fannish commitments like the plague, but I think it sounds like a pretty cool idea.

And maybe this is me as a redial mod talking, but it could be fun to, in the post where you open to people who didn't specifically volunteer that episode, also allow recs for older fic related to that episode (I know with redial it's a fun resource to have - the collection of episode-related fannish content).

I don't know that this really fits in with

friendshipper idea, but:

margarks has been actively prompting for ep-specific recs over in

sga_rewind, so maybe that's already covered? Though certainly it doesn't hurt to encourage it in multiple places! (There's also a per-episode tags comm, but I keep forgetting it ....)

Thanks! :)

On the recs thing, it'd probably be a neat thing to have, but I think there's too much overlap with both

sga_rewind and

sga_episodefic to make it worth the extra effort. (Also, I'm not planning on doing a post each day to open up the comm to a new episode. Every day for three months? NO WAY. The big advantage, for me, to a no-pressure ficathon is that I don't have to go hunting down people and hounding them for their fic. They'll either post it or they won't; it's low-stress for me too. Unless there are a bunch of people who want to co-mod, this is going to be pretty DIY without a lot of hands-on moderation.)

*nods*

(ah! I think I understand better now. And apparently there are more resources than what I was aware of already)

Good luck with it! I'll keep an eye out for when/if you get up and running. Ficathons (heck, most fannish commitments) definitely work better when you can minimize modly pressure.

*nods vigorously* I've overcommitted myself on mod duties before and it's not fun. I don't want this to turn into something that I'd hate and resent. Just something cheerful and low-pressure for everyone -- including me!

Would this be fic alone?

I've never taken to episode tags - I'll read them occasionally, but have never written them. I suppose I like the episode to be the episode, whether for good or bad.

There are things I'd love to so for each episode, that sadly don't fit into the current space of SGA rewind.

Then again I don;t think they'd necessarly fit here either. I don't know.

I would say anything could be welcome -- fic, icons, vids, wallpapers, Lego sculptures ... whatever people want to make! Just a little treat each day. (Or an epic, if someone wanted to write one ... but it's not required.)

I love tagging eppys! I also work better when a specific idea/challenge is given to me. Alas, I only write Rodney fics, but he was in a few episodes, wasn't he? :D

Just a few, yes. :D

Interesting! That definitely sounds like fun.

Squee!

I'm only a reader and not a writer in the SGA fandom, but I'd still love to see that happen!

Writers need readers! It just doesn't work without 'em.

Oh, I love that idea. It reminds me of

ats_endofdays, which was tremendous fun. Timing sounds good, too.

Yeah, it seemed like a nice slot in the fandom calendar to have something like this -- after the Christmas ficathons and before the spring ones go into full swing. Just a fairly uneventful time of year in which not much is going on.

(The community you linked to -- yeah, that looks very similar! :) I wasn't in that fandom, but I think it's quite cool that it's been done before and it works!)

Would I sign up? Duh! Half my fics are episode tags. This is right up my alley! *g*
(Hey, and maybe we could work out some cooperation/crossposting thing with

sga_episodefic for submitted fics?)

Ooh, the crossposting thing -- that's a good idea! I don't want to end up with too much flist duplication, but I absolutely love sga_episodefic as a resource for finding tags!

This sounds like a cool idea. The only question is whether it will be only one person per episode or if you are allowing multiple people to post for episodes. The slightly hands-off no-stress sounds like a great idea too.

The more I think about it, the more I think that probably allowing multiple sign-ups for individual episodes is a good idea because people almost certainly *will* drop out. And a couple people suggested that posting should be open to anyone, even if they didn't sign up for that day, and I don't have any problem with that, either! The sign-ups will be mostly just to give people a goal, not a straitjacket.

This sounds really interesting! I added you to my friendslist to see how this goes. I hope that is okay?

Sure, friend away! :)

Love this idea! I'm not good at writing SGA, but I'm more than willing to beta for anyone interested :) Preference is for McShep or Rodney centric (McKeller does make me squick, though)

Thank you for the offer -- I know betas are always needed. :) Doing a beta thread once I get things up and running would probably be a good idea!

Sounds like a great idea - I'll sign up! I hope it'll be fic, but it might end up as digital art. I'm assuming people will be asked to put whether their contribution is gen, ship or slash, so people don't get any unwanted surprises!! Looking forward to this (has to think about what eps she's interested in and hasn't already done fic for...).

Oh yes, stories would definitely need to be labeled with pairing/rating for the fest -- that way people can find what they want and avoid what they don't.

With the vids, would it just be a case of making any type of vid using only the clips from a given episode? I'm only asking because I've tried to do episode tags in vid form before, and it was really difficult, and the kind of 'thon you're proposing would be an awesome excuse to make a bunch of vidlets for random episodes.

That's what I was thinking, yes -- vids of any length (even little short ones) using clips from the episode.

SGA vidding seems to have really fallen off in the last year or two (unless it's happening in places I'm not watching) and it would be lovely to see more!

In which case, I am most definitely in. I've got a list of episode specific vids for SGA that I've never got around to making before, and this could well be just the excuse I need!

Cool idea! I'd probably try to participate!

I have nothing really to add other than I think this would be a cool idea. I really want to get back in the habit of watching the older eppys. I know there are new coms and such open for such things bu SGA Big Bang is kicking my a$$ right now until the dang thing is done!

But, yes on this!

I think it sounds like it would be fun. I know I'd love to read it.

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I have ... a cunning plan?

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